Eroan had seen illusions before.
Visions. Echoes. Phantoms of forgotten worlds.
But nothing prepared him for the moment the cat’s eyes widened—
a blink, soft and harmless
and the world beneath him fractured.
The air folded into itself like glass dipped into boiling water.
The place dimmed. The dirt vanished.
And Eroan’s breath caught as a maze unfolded around him—
endless corridors of pale stone, each pulsing like veins under skin. He took a single step forward, and the ground twisted, swallowing the path behind him.
He had no time to react.
The maze swallowed him whole.
His heart hammered, but he walked, each step echoing through a hollow that didn’t exist seconds ago. Walls shifted around him like lungs breathing. Shadows stretched unnaturally long. The air tasted of cold iron.
Time lost meaning. All occurred in a blink of an eye.
He blinked--
and the maze collapsed into night.
Suddenly he was back.
The cat was gone. The place returned but really different than before. All around the old park there was a forest so deep that no one would dare to enter at night.
The earth beneath him stabilized.
But the ring on his finger glowed—
too bright, too alive. Its sapphire light flickered like frantic heartbeat.
Eroan exhaled shakily.
"Am I seriously not dreaming?? Also, what's with the 'ring'!! It's been glowing all night."
He moved hand and was adjusting his hair steadying his breath.
A whisper of wind sliced past his skull.
His eyes widened.
An arrow had appeared out of the darkness, inches from his face. Without thinking, he tilted slightly moving and as he did that he caught the shaft between his fingers clean.
Right after catching it he turned back toward where it came from, brows lowered, hair falling over one eye.
“Man,” he muttered, tired already, “I can’t catch a break. Can I?”
A laugh drifted through the trees.
Light crackled, faint sparks glimmering behind the sound of an ancient trunk. Something lingered behind it playful, dangerous.
Eroan stepped forward cautiously.
The light flicked away
and a girl stepped out. To be specific a fine woman came out.
No! even calling her a woman was too simple.
She walked with a confident amusement, a grin tugging at the corner of her lips as if she already owned the moment. As she lowered her twin blades, threads of light wrapped around her body like weaving armor. Dark fabric thickened, hardened, reshaped itself.
In a moment, It glows and an armor type suit was being made on the spot.
She stepped forward clad in a sleek,tight black armor that clung to her form like living shadow. Sharp, emerald-lined patterns ran across the armor more like outfit, giving the metal an eerie, organic texture as if it had grown around her rather than been forged. Her high collar and jagged shoulder plates sharpened her silhouette, making her appear taller, darker, and undeniably regal. Every part of her armor-her torso, arms, and long dark heels flowed together in one seamless design, elegant yet lethal, like a queen born from darkness and war. The outfit was a mix of emerald green and black.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Her hair, midnight black, fluttered in an unfelt wind.
And her eyes-
dark green, so sharp they looked carved from crystal.
Eroan touched the back of his head moving his hand trying to calm himself.
“Well,” he sighed, “now who might you be ma’am?”
She brushed a stray strand of hair back, hand lifting gracefully.
“Ooh, boy,” she said, voice airy, amused.
“You don’t know anything.”
With a flick of her hand
a simple, elegant upward motion that looked almost lazy
the world that Eroan entered was beginning it's destruction.
Air pressure slammed into Eroan before he could brace. His boots tore across the ground, his body dragged like a ragdoll through stone and roots. Walls,trees and boulders—he broke through them all, crashing end over end until the ground itself cracked beneath him.
He forced both arms upward, crossing them to absorb the shock. Even then, pain rippled across his bones.
Dust rose slowly around him as he stood.
“Okay…” Eroan muttered, spitting dirt, “that was uncalled for.”
She stepped forward, calm, graceful, almost unbothered.
Her armor gleamed—black and emerald, seamless like a second skin. The organic patterns along her limbs pulsed faintly, glowing with a heartbeat not entirely her own.
She moved her hand again.
Invisible force wrapped around Eroan like cold chains.
His feet lifted from the ground before he could summon strength. He was hurled again, this time deliberately aimed—
straight into thick pillars of rock.
Crack after crack sounded as he was swung like a weapon. The world blurred in violent arcs. Stones splintered. Trees folded under the weight of his body.
But through it all—the ring didn’t flicker. It was the same as before. No aura just blue light.
Didn’t dim.
Didn’t broke out.
Her eyes narrowed a hint.
“So durable,” she mused.
“How inconvenient.”
She flicked her wrist.
After seeing his durability she pushes him above and makes him enter a different dimension. Another world of reality - the one that holds the eternal pain and there only awaits nightmares.
Reality split. A portal opened shaped like-
A circle—sky blue, edged with shifting sapphire glyphs opened behind Eroan like the maw of a living star. Energy flowed around it in spirals, lines that bent space in slow, mesmerizing arcs. The dimensional circle was couldn't be bounded. It was endless and the circle was sky blue. There was nothing - All there was - sapphire energy sparking through and through the dimensions. Swallowing everything in front of it . Only with the exception of the user.
She shoved him toward it with another burst of invisible force.
Eroan forced his feet to stay standstill on the ground into the dirt, resisting with everything he had—
but the pull of the dimensional rift was relentless.
As he slid toward it, he clenched his fists and grit his teeth.
“Why…” he muttered through breathless exhaustion,
“why is everyone coming after me now?
Where were you people when I was alone in my life?
She paused.
The faint smirk on her lips widened. She brought her hand to her face, covering part of her expression in amused disbelief.
“You didn’t know that?”
Her laugh echoed with cold delight.
“You really know nothing. You hopeless child.”
She lowered her hand slightly, revealing a grin.
“Everyone’s after the ring.”
Eroan froze.
Not in fear—
but in realization.
The ring hummed violently, a trembling pulse radiating into the air.
His eyes drifted to it.
“…everyone?” Then he completely got lost and blanked to nowhere.
“You finally understand.”
Her smile sharpened.
“Good boy”
The dimensional pull intensified.
The rift swallowed him.
The Nightmare Realm.
The world twisted around him—
colors bleeding into each other, sounds folding into silence.
Heat and cold struck him at the same time.
Nothing here had shape, yet everything felt too close.
The nightmare dimension didn't only hurt him physically.
It dissected him mentally.
Flashes of old memories—
shadows of fears he didn’t know there was. The pain of all the countless people that had been here. The people that were swallowed by it and was left with nothing but emptiness. Each second felt like an eternity. He had to experience through all of it. To him- it was reality and his body was being torn apart. Tortured by force that couldn't be seen nor sense. Just a feeling of pain. He was like being eaten from flesh to flesh. Though all were happening too fast for him to experience it to the fullest. Perhaps, the lady knew his durability and was holding back enough to not kill him. He couldn't sense anything except for blood, pain and suffering. There was nothing but darkness for him and world of blood for others. He died over and over again In that realm in the most gruesome ways possible only to be healed again. At one moment, there were Steel spikes all entering in all of his body. Not leaving a single part. From head to toe. He was being burned alive continuously.
whispers of his own voice speaking truths he never admitted—
they all surrounded him. He had to experience all of it. The past and future was given on his shoulders at present. He might've lost his presence. There was no one around to help him.
He staggered but forced himself forward.
"I have to get out."
The darkness thickened, pressing on his lungs. His knees shook. A sharp, buzzing pain crawled behind his eyes as if the world tried to peel his thoughts apart.
But Eroan pushed
and almost broke free.
He almost gets out from the nightmare. The eternal pain that was holding off- he got through it but the lady wouldn't let him get out so, the atmosphere shifts and darkens.
The rift flickered ahead, a small tear in the nightmare wall. He ran, reaching toward the light—
But she wouldn’t allow that.
The atmosphere behind him darkened.
Her aura dark green with black shades in it fissures—burst into the realm, coating the space like a living storm. The air tasted like cold metal and ash. Her presence alone made the dimension crack as if it feared her.
Eroan collapsed, clutching his head as waves of pressure tore through his senses.
His scream echoed through the dimension but not from pain
from the overwhelming force crushing his consciousness.
For a moment, his eyes rolled back—
and turned pure white.
The ring reacted instantly.
It flared—
brighter, fiercer, deeper.
Sapphire light shifted to a dark, violent blue that pulsed like a star collapsing in on itself.
Energy streamed along its edges, forming dark blue lines that spiraled up his arm. The dimension trembled.
She stepped the rift to the edge, blades lowered.
“Darling,” she whispered softly,
“Sorry—
but you must suffer.
I am here for the ring that chose you.”
Her voice was both pity and mockery.
Eroan clung to the edge of the circle, refusing to fall back inside. Sparks of sapphire energy slipped past his fingers. His body trembled, but he didn’t let go.
She pushed her hand and opened the palm like she was asking for something.
“Come now. I'll put an end to your suffering."
The circle wavered, threatening to collapse.
Her aura surged black and green swallowing the sky—and with excitement in her voice, she stepped forward:
“That’s it.
This is the moment I’ve been waiting for.
Come to me.”
The ring’s dark blue aura started to leak and created dark lines that spread violently inside the rift, forming intricate patterns across the dimension’s walls. There was countless dark blue lines like that through the entire dimension.
Eroan’s grip began to slip. The moment the lady let the ring grew darker and losen her power for it.
His eyes flickered as he came back to sense.
A memory surfaced.
A detail he had caug
ht earlier while she formed her armor—
a name embedded within its runic glow.
Just a flicker.
Barely noticeable.
But he had memorized it. He had kept it as a last resort if trick up his sleeve.
He took a breath and shouted—
“Ira!! Is that you?"
She stopped pushing him through the dimension and let him come back to reality. The world changed completely and came back to normal. The same park it was before. She stared at him awkwardly curious.
Then came a blade flying at an unimaginable speed directly aimed at Eroan's throat. Fate had it worse for him.
